 I was born right before WW2 started in El Paso in 1938. My mother was 45, dad 53, and they had already raised 4 kids. My brother was 25 years older than me, my youngest sister 15 years older. I was obviously an “ooops” baby. I grew up with 10 nieces and nephews, all my age. The 3 still living still call me Uncle David. One nephew , Richard, that Phil and Katha Danz met at my 80th birthday party, was born just 10 days after me. One of my first memories was hearing president Truman on the radio in 1945 announcing the end of WW2. I grew up on a small farm in rural El Paso near the Rio Grande River. I milked our cow, fed our chickens, had a pet lamb, and, of course, a horse. We had an orchard and grew enough vegetables to be self-sufficient. I walked two miles to a country school. I had a rather uneventful time in high school. No sports. I did take piano lessons for 10 years and accompanied two choirs in high school. In 1956 I went to Rice University in Houston and majored in architecture (my dad was an architect in El Paso). As close as I ever got to sports was to be a Rice cheer leader. I was the first in our family to get a college degree. In 1960, after college, I went in the Navy (we still had the draft) and served as an operations officer on the USS Enterprise. During those years we made three six month tours in the Mediterranean Sea hitting every port, and were off the coast of Cuba during the Cuban missile crisis. After the Navy I went back to Houston to start my professional career. I had my own architectural firm for a short time, then worked for an international architectural firm managing projects (mostly educational) across the United States and in the Middle East. After spending 35 years in Houston, I came to Sacramento in 1994 and managed a construction management company office for Kitchell (that is the company currently remodeling the convention center and performing arts hall here in Sacramento). I finished my professional career as the State Architect of California from 2005 to 2010. I am married to my second wife, Dana Newell, who you all know. I have two daughters, Cai (who some of you heard when she made a presentation on her work in Turkey several years ago) and Kendall, who lives in Ohio. You met my only grandson, Toby, when he was here with Cai at my demotion earlier this year. I have been a member of Carmichael Rotary since 2012. President 2-1/4 times (sharing one year with Vince Iosso, Jay Boatwright and Stan Roe). I was the first President when we established our Foundation, and will be president again starting in July. I co-chaired the Uganda water project with Richard Olebe and had the opportunity to visit the completed project along with Phil and Mark in 2019. Fun facts: *Besides my 10 nieces and nephews, I have 18 great; 19 great-great; and 15 great-great-great nieces and nephews. That is a total of 62 nieces and nephews. There are 74 total if you count those from my former wife’s and Dana’s families. *For you doctors in the club: I was raised in Christian Science. I never saw a doctor until I joined the Navy at age 22. Later I was very active in the Episcopal Church until I had a run in with an Episcopal bishop about 20 years ago. *I have been to 40 countries either working, with the Navy or vacationing, and all 50 states, except North and South Dakota. *My heritage is German from my dad Otto; Scotch, English and French from my mother Adelia. *David has the distinction of being on his way to a Guinness world record by accompanying his two cats Boots & Buster on a walk to end of his cul-de-sac every evening (for years) with a martini - rain or shine! (Bulletin Editor's addition) | 
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